Scarlett Johansson, Colin Jost debate selling Staten Island ferry
Staten Island has never seen this much drama.
Scarlett Johansson and Colin Jost debated over whether or not they should sell the ferry that the comedian bought with his fellow Staten Island native Pete Davidson.
Johansson, 40, made her case against Jost, 42, on Wednesday’s episode of “TODAY with Jenna & Friends.”
“If anybody out there would like to start a GoFundMe for the Staten Island ferry, please be my guest,” said Johansson, who is co-hosting the morning show with Jenna Bush Hager all week.
“I don’t know if I’m speaking for the Staten Island ferry or against it, but help our family, okay?” the mom of two continued. “This has now become a telethon for ‘Support the Staten Island ferry.’”
It was then Jost’s turn to defend keeping the ferry.
“I hope you have a good thick pair of gloves at home, because some day you’re going to be getting so many paper cuts from all the checks that start rolling in from this ferry,” Jost told his wife. “It is going to put food on our table, finally.”
“I believe in this ferry, if anyone out there believes in it, please go to the GoFundMe,” the “Saturday Night Live” star added.
But Johansson continued to argue that the couple should do away with the ferry.
“If we sell it for scrap metal, we could actually maybe,” she said, before Jost interjected, “That’s what you need the gloves for? Handling the scrap metal?”
Bush Hager, 43, asked the pair to clarify if ‘the ferry can be taken away from the dock.”
While Johansson was unsure, Jost answered, “I mean, could it be let loose to just drift? Yeah. 100 percent. It’s actually one of the things our insurers are worried about.”
After hearing out both sides, Bush Hager ultimately sided with Johansson for giving what she deemed the stronger argument.
“We’ll see,” Jost dejectedly said. “You’ll all see!”
Jost and Davidson, 31, purchased the retired vessel at auction for $280,000 in 2022. The partnership, which includes architect and developer Ron Castellano and comedy club owner Paul Italia, reportedly planned to convert it into a $34 million entertainment venue.
Last year, Jost told People that buying the ferry was “absolutely the dumbest and least thought-through purchase I’ve ever made in my life.”
Page Six previously reported that the “SNL” duo allegedly bought the boat while they were “very stoned.”
“The way I justified it is for the amount of money we were putting into buying it, on just a basic square-footage level, is if you found the right place for it to be, you were essentially buying a building on its side that’s 65,000 square feet,” Jost explained at NY Fashion Week in September. “So around New York, that is a very good price per square foot.”
In 2023, Davidson told Seth Meyers that he and Jost want to turn the boat into an entertainment venue.
“We wanna be able to dock it from April to September, maybe October, in New York and it will be like a restaurant,” said Davidson. “There will be a concert venue. There will be a movie theater, upstairs like, sort of, restaurant area. And then there’s hotels in it. So, we’ll have like you know a couple of those. And then in the winter tug it to Miami.”
